542 



METEOROLOGY. 



on this continent only scattered stations at 

 Quito, Lima, Rio Janeiro, Georgetown, Suri- 

 nam, and Trinidad, whose observations are 

 either not published at all, or are contributed 

 to the scientific periodicals. A systematic or- 

 ganization is promised for stations in Brazil, 

 and is much to be desired for. Peru and Gui- 

 ana. 



Spain. The central meteorological office is 

 in charge of A. Aguilar, Director of the Royal 

 Observatory at Madrid. It receives reports 

 from 30 home stations, including Portugal (26 

 telegraphic), all of which are published in an 

 annual " Resumen." A daily telegraph bulle- 

 tin is published, and storm-warnings are issued 

 when sent from Paris and London. The ma- 

 rine observatory at San Fernando (Captain Pu- 

 jazon, director) publishes its own observations 

 in full. In the Spanish colonies the most im- 

 portant meteorological stations are at Manila 

 and Porto Rico. 



Siceden. About 30 stations (9 telegraphic), 

 and several naval vessels report to the Central 

 Meteorological Institute at Stockholm (R. Ru- 

 bensson, director), -which publishes a daily tel- 

 egraphic bulletin and annual volumes. At 

 Lund and Upsala the observatories of the uni- 

 versities publish their own observations sepa- 

 rately. 



Switzerland. The Central Institute for Swiss 

 Meteorology has its seat at Zurich. Wolf, its 

 President, and Director of the Observatory, 

 publishes in full the observations at about 15 

 stations. The total number of reporting sta- 

 tions is about 80. The observatories at Bern 

 (under Foster) and Geneva (under Plantamour) 

 also publish their own work in detail. The 

 central meteorological office is understood to 

 be maintained by the Swiss Association and 

 not by the etate. 



Syria. Observations are maintained at the 

 Syrian College (Protestant Mission) in Beyrout, 

 and a more extended system is understood to 

 have been recently organized under the British 

 and American " Palestine Exploration " Socie- 

 ties. 



Turkey. The central observatory at Con- 

 stantinople (A. Coumbary, director) receives 

 reports from about 30 stations, publishes a daily 

 telegraphic bulletin of 17 stations, a month- 

 ly resume, and its own observations in full, and 

 issues storrn-warnings. 



United States. The study of meteorology 

 was especially advanced in this country by the 

 establishment of a series of observations at 

 military posts by Surgeon-General Lovell in 

 1818; these are still kept up, and constitute the 

 oldest national series of uniform meteorologi- 

 cal observations now extant. Similar system- 

 atic observations were maintained or ordered 

 by the States of New York (1825-1863), Penn- 

 sylvania (1836-1842), Ohio (1842), and Illinois 

 (1856), all which organizations are now obso- 

 lete. The State boards of health, of public 

 works, of agriculture, etc., and the agricultural 

 societies, the American Association for the 



Advancement of Science, numerous geological 

 surveys, and local societies, most prominent 

 among which is the Franklin Institute of Phil- 

 adelphia, have also contributed in innumerable 

 ways to meteorological observation and re- 

 search. In 1847 the Smithsonian Institution 

 at its very outset began the work of fostering 

 meteorology. In 1849 it began to receive re- 

 ports from various stations, and subsequently, 

 in connection with the Patent-Office Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, its stations increased to 

 several hundred, and its publications came to 

 rank as among the most important that ap- 

 peared anywhere. 



In 1841 Espy published his " Philosophy of 

 Storms," and in 1842 was appointed meteorolo- 

 gist in the Surgeon-General's office of the War 

 Department. He here carried out his great 

 work of mapping the weather day by day, 

 which he had previously begun. In his first 

 report on meteorology to the Surgeon-General, 

 dated October 9, 1843, he states that over 50 

 barometric and over 60 non-barometric observ- 

 ers were already reporting to him. This, his 

 first published "Report," contains 23 charts, 

 illustrating the weather and progress of storms 

 from January to June, 1843, and constitutes 

 by far the most important contribution to our 

 knowledge of storms that had then been made 

 by any government in the world. After remain- 

 ing for some years in the Surgeon-General's 

 office, Mr. Espy was appointed to some similar 

 position under the Secretary of the Navy, to 

 whom he made his " Second " and " Third Re- 

 port on Meteorology," dated respectively No- 

 vember 12, 1849, and January 24, 1851, and pub- 

 lished together (inl852?) with additional weath- 

 er-maps of the storms in 1844 and 1845. His 

 "Fourth Report on Meteorology" was ad- 

 dressed to the Senate in 1854, although con- 

 taining many items added in 1856, and was 

 printed in 1857. It contains many new maps 

 of storms from 1845 to 1852, selected from the 

 whole number of 1,800 that he had thus far 

 compiled. In 1856 Mr. Espy removed to Cin- 

 cinnati, where he delivered a course of lectures 

 on the subject to which forty years of his life 

 had been devoted, and where he died in 1857, 

 at the age of seventy-two. We have been thus 

 minute in specifying Mr. Espy's publications, 

 because of his great services to meteorology. 

 He may have dwelt too strongly on some 

 points, or have gone to some extremes in other 

 matters, but on the whole his enthusiasm and 

 the conviction that he had made a great stride 

 in the study of storms produced a quiet acqui- 

 escence in the minds of thousands throughout 

 the world, that prepared the way for further 

 progress. The daily weathermaps and pre- 

 dictions of the Smithsonian Institution (1850- 

 1860) and of the Cincinnati Observatory (1869 

 and 1870), the theoretical work of Professor 

 Ferrel, the work in ocean meteorology at the 

 Hydrographic Office arid Naval Observatory 

 (Gilliss, 1838-'42; Maury, 1842-'61), all were 

 more or less stimulated by the interest every- 



